It’s time to talk about coal

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Press release - 14 January, 2013

Sydney, Monday 14th January, 2013: Today, academics, scientists, prominent Australians and community groups placed a full-page ad in The Australian Financial Review calling for an end to Australia’s coal export expansion and an honest national discussion about the role it plays in driving climate change.

The Climate Commission issued a report over the weekend that confirmed: “Climate change has contributed to making the current extreme heat conditions and bushfires worse."

Citing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Bureau of Meteorology, the CSIRO and the Prime Minister, the signatories underscore the relationship between extreme weather and climate change and argue Australia faces a choice to either, ‘cease expansion of coal exports or wilfully threaten our children’s future.’

“As the Prime Minister reminded everyone last week, ‘…we do know that over time as a result of climate change we are going to see more extreme weather events’. We agree,” said Dr. Georgina Woods, Greenpeace Climate Campaigner.

Currently, coal exports are Australia‘s biggest contribution to climate change. The proposed development of vast new mines means this contribution could double in the next decade – the critical decade in which coal use and greenhouse emissions must be dramatically reduced.

“As the next wave of heat pulses across the continent, our thoughts are with all those families and communities fighting to protect the people and places we love. But we are doing neither them, nor future generations, any service by continuing to ignore the contribution our coal exports make to climate change.”

“The latest heatwave is yet another wake-up call. It’s time we got serious about protecting our beautiful country and stop the expansion of export coal,” concluded Dr. Woods.